This invention relates to fatigue and structural analyses and, more particularly, to a method, system and computer program product, typically embodied in an Internet-based solution, that provides for automated fatigue and structural analysis to generate results, such as margins of safety.
Structural components such as airframes, automobiles, bridges, etc., are subjected to various types of forces throughout their intended design life. These forces create stresses in the structure that can eventually cause wear, damage, and the possible failure of the structure. As such, fatigue and structural analysis of many structural components (structural components is also referred herein as structural elements or elements) is important during the design process. Fatigue and structural analyses provide structural designers with critical information used to determine the likelihood and the causes of fatigue related structural failures. Once the structural designers have the results of the fatigue and structural analyses, they can design the individual elements and the overall structure so as to withstand the anticipated stress levels over the design lifetime.
Fatigue and structural analyses are particularly important for structures that are subject to extreme forces over the lifetime of the structure. For instance, aircraft structures experience a variety of intense forces as they repeatedly take off, fly, perform various maneuvers and land over the lifetime of the aircraft. These forces create stresses internally in the structure, which may cause wear, damage, and possible failure of the structure if it is not properly designed to withstand the anticipated stresses.
In general, fatigue and structural analyses are performed using a series of analysis tools. The tools typically include customized computer programs for a specific structural design (e.g., an F-15 fighter aircraft). The programs typically do not interact with each other directly and are often hosted on computer platforms that cannot communicate with one another. As such, specially trained analysts must be involved throughout the design process to check, modify, and translate the inputs and outputs of each computer program. The fatigue and structural analysis process is time consuming and inefficient because designers must delay their structural design work until specially trained fatigue analysts develop xe2x80x9cfatigue allowablesxe2x80x9d (the maximum repeated stress a structural component can withstand without failure) for each specific structural element. Development of the fatigue allowables is time consuming because it involves determining the anticipated loading throughout each component""s design life, generating the fatigue life prediction of each component based on the loading and material properties of the component, and relaying this information back to the structural designer. The designer must then compute the maximum stress in the component based on its current configuration and compare that stress to the fatigue allowable. If the component is determined to have an inadequate fatigue life, the designer must change the configuration of the component and repeat the maximum stress analysis process.
The fatigue and structural analysis processes used in the past are also inflexible because they are tailored to specific computer platforms. And, typically, there are multiple computing platforms involved in the process requiring translation of intermediate results to different computer platforms that are not compatible with one another. For example, when developing the fatigue allowables, different computer applications are generally required to determine the anticipated loading throughout each component""s design life, generate the fatigue life prediction of each component based upon the loading and material properties of the component, and compute the maximum stress in the component based upon its current configuration.
For the reasons discussed above, there exists a need for an automated fatigue and structural analysis system that combines and manages the separate fatigue and structural analysis tools such that analysts without specialized training and on various computer platforms may quickly obtain useful fatigue and structural analysis results. Specifically, the need is for a fatigue and structural analysis system that automatically accesses and runs the appropriate fatigue and structural analysis tools to quickly analyze user-provided information regarding a structural component and provide an immediate report of the fatigue and structural analysis results without further manual input.
In accordance with the present invention, a method, system and computer program product, typically embodied as an Internet-based solution, are provided for automated fatigue and structural analyses. The method, system and computer program product consolidate and manage the fatigue and structural analysis tools and are responsive to user requests for fatigue and structural analyses based upon user-provided information. As such, the method, system and computer program product of the present invention automatically select and run the appropriate fatigue and structural analysis tools, and automatically evaluate the outputs of the tools to provide immediately useful fatigue and structural analysis results to the user without requiring further manual input. Thus, designers without specialized training can quickly obtain fatigue and structural analysis results. In addition, because the method, system and computer program product of the present invention consolidate and manage the fatigue and structural analysis tools, the tools may be accessed from remote locations via the Internet, intranet or other computer network. The method, system and computer program product of the present invention, therefore, save time and increase the efficiency of the design process by opening up the process to designers and eliminating the delay that would otherwise be caused by manually performing fatigue and structural analyses by specially trained analysts.
The method, system and computer program product for automated fatigue and structural analyses of the present invention receive a request to perform fatigue and structural analyses based upon information regarding the structural element of interest. In this regard, the system may include a client component (e.g., a web browser) for receiving the information. Based upon the information regarding the structural element, the method, system and computer program product of the present invention automatically perform the fatigue and structural analyses without requiring further manual input and automatically provide the results of the fatigue and structural analyses. In this regard, the system may also include a processing component (e.g., a server) for automatically performing the fatigue and structural analyses and automatically providing the results of the fatigue and structural analyses to the client component.
Embodiments of the method and system of the present invention also may store the results of the fatigue and structural analyses in a storage element. Other embodiments of the method of the present invention include determining dimensions of the structural element and the material composition of the element based upon the results of the fatigue and structural analyses.
In one advantageous embodiment of the method, system and computer program product of the present invention, the fatigue analysis includes automatically determining a fatigue allowable for the structural element and automatically determining the actual maximum stress in the element. The fatigue allowable for the structural element may be calculated by determining an anticipated loading of the structural element over time and, based upon the anticipated loading of the structural element over time, determining the maximum allowable stress to which the structural element may be subjected. The actual maximum stress for the structural element may be determined by applying a reference load to the structural element to ascertain the actual stress to which the structural element will be subjected. The method, system and computer program product of the present invention then automatically compare the actual maximum stress to the fatigue allowable to determine the margin of safety for the structural element.
The method, system and computer program product of the present invention described herein saves time and increases the efficiency for design processes that require fatigue and structural analyses because the present invention is automated to quickly provide fatigue and structural analysis results. Without the automated features of the present invention, a specially trained analyst would have to manually perform the separate fatigue and structural analyses and manually evaluate the outputs of the analyses to determine and provide the necessary fatigue and structural analysis results before the design process could proceed.
Other useful embodiments of the method, system and computer program product permit the implementation of the present invention via the Internet, intranet or other computer network. Specifically, the system of one embodiment of the present invention includes a client component (e.g., a web browser) and a processing element, such as a server, that are remote from one another and the Internet, intranet or other computer network for interconnecting the client component and the processing element. The system of this embodiment of the present invention may also include a plurality of distributed client components interconnected to the processing elements via the Internet, intranet or other computer network. Regardless of the configuration, each client component may present at least one web page to solicit the required information for fatigue and structural analyses. As such, the required information and the request to perform fatigue and structural analysis may be received from a plurality of distributed clients based upon information input into the respective web pages. The required information and the request to perform fatigue and structural analysis would then be transmitted from the plurality of distributed clients to one or more common processing components via the Internet, intranet or other computer network.
These useful embodiments of the method, system and computer program product of the present invention further reduce the time and increase the efficiency of the design process because they enable the features of the present invention to be performed from different locations via the Internet, intranet or other computer network and in a platform-independent manner. These embodiments are significant improvements over the time consuming and inefficient fatigue and structural analysis previously performed by specially trained analysts on specific workstations with manual evaluation of the results before the design process may proceed.